NA TURE 



;73 



THURSDAY. MAY i8, igii. 



TUh NORTH POLE. 



'he Xorth Pole. By Robert E. Peary. With an in- 

 troduction by Theodore Roosevelt. Pp. xii + 326. 

 (London : Hodder and Stoughton, 1910.) Price 

 25s. net. 



PEARY'S narrative of the journey by which he 

 reached the North Pole and satisfied his life's 

 ambition cannot fail to command the respect of all 

 who appreciate indomitable perseverance, high 

 courage, and unfaltering devotion to an ideal. Peary 

 cheerfullv accepted months of drudgery, for although 

 he describes life on the march in the Arctic as a 

 dog's life, he regards the work as a man's work; 

 and although he met with repeated disappointment — 

 for beating the northern record without reaching the 

 pole he despises as an empty bauble — his devotion 

 was at length rewarded by well-earned success. 

 Peary's last journey will probably always be his most 

 famous, for it accomplished one of the greatest 

 geographical quests ; but its results are probably of 

 less real geographical value than his exploration of 

 northern Greenland, one of the most important of 

 Arctic achievements. 



Peary's book on the whole is disappointing. Its 

 form at once arouses the prejudice of those who do 

 not buy books by bulk. It is unnecessarily large, its 

 size is increased by some illustrations which are 

 neither instructive nor ornamental, and by the use of 

 vast margins to the pages. The book is issued 

 regardless of the congested conditions of most people's 

 bookshelves, and is apparently intended for those who 

 can find space for works with a large proportion of 

 blank paper. The book has obviously been prepared 

 in haste; the illustrations are in no particular order, 

 •nd their titles cannot have been corrected by the 

 iuthor. Thus the view of the stone cairn, entitled 



Camp Morris K. Jessup," that is, the camp at the 

 North Pole, should be "Cape Morris K. Jessup," a 

 mistake which might give rise to a serious mis- 

 understanding. There is a map, inconveniently large, 

 from which Crocker Land, one of Peary's most sug- 

 ;estive discoveries, has been omitted. 



The book has no particular literary charm, 

 although it is occasionally enlivened by touches of 

 American humour, such as the statement that the 

 atmosphere in Eskimo huts can be handled with a 

 shovel. 



The most interesting part of the book is the de- 

 scription of the Eskimo whose Mongolian affinities 

 Admiral Peary clearly recognises. The account shows 

 the author's tendency to judge everything by Arctic 

 standards. Thus because the fair-skinned Eskimo 

 were not as much impressed by white men as were 

 some dark races, Peary dismisses with scorn the 

 idea that any aborigines regarded the first Europeans 

 they saw as superhuman. "Much nonsense," he says 

 (P- 53)) " has been told by travellers in remote lands 

 about the aborigines regarding as gods the white men 



NO. 2168, VOL. 86] 



who come to them, but I have never placed much 

 credence in these stories." 



The book tells in detail the story of the expedition 

 and its equipment ; but in spite of the space available 

 there are many omissions of the ver>' things one 

 would most like to know. Thus Pear\' claims that 

 the success of his dash to the pole was only possible 

 owing to the new sledges and portable stove that he 

 designed for the expedition. He does not give future 

 travellers the benefit of any descriptions of these in- 

 struments and their novel features. There is also 

 little in this book to answer the criticism of those 

 who have questioned Peary's actual attainment of 

 the pole. There is an appendix by Mr. Henry Gan- 

 nett, Admiral Chester, and Mr. O. H. Tittman, who 

 state that they have examined Peary's journal and 

 records, and they are unanimously of the opinion 

 that he reached the pole. Some adequate statement 

 of the evidence that was laid before these distin- 

 guished authorities might have been given as one 

 of the appendices, of which there are three. There is 

 no reason to distrust the fact that Peary reached the 

 pole, or sufficiently near it for any practical purpose. 

 The great increase in his pace after he parted from 

 Captain Bartlett is not explained in the text, but the 

 photoerraphs of the area round the pole show wide 

 stretches of smooth ice, hence exceptionallv easy ice 

 conditions may account for the speed of the final 

 marches. 



It is not easy to follow the story of the last few 

 days of the approach to the pole, especially as the 

 continuous daylight renders his references to morning 

 and evening less helpful than they would be in 

 following an ordinary itinerary. A tabular statement 

 of his marches would have been very useful. The 

 numerous references to the observations taken and 

 the facsimiles of some of the calculations are not 

 convincing, especially as a curious statement on 

 p. 241 suggests that Peary has onlv a rule of thumb 

 acquaintance with astronomical methods. He re- 

 marks that he had to strain every nerve to arrive at 

 the pole by noon, so that he could at once take an 

 observation for latitude; but at the pole the sun 

 would be moving round at nearly a constant altitude, 

 so that any time would have served for the observa- 

 tions, and time would not enter into the computation. 



The author gives an interesting description of the 

 arduous voyage up and down Kennedy Channel. He 

 tells us that only four ships have made this dangerous 

 passage, and of these one was lost and two were 

 badly damaged. Peary's experiences show that Sir 

 George Nares's successful navigation of this channel 

 in the Alert is a feat which has not received the 

 credit it deserves. 



The most interesting geographical contribution in 

 the book is the discussion by Mr. R. A. Harris, of the 

 United States Coast Survey, of the bathvmetric and 

 tidal observations. The soundings taken show 

 that a continental shelf covered by 100 fathoms of 

 water extends for forty-six miles north of Grant 

 Land. From the edge of this shelf, the sea deepens 

 rapidly to 825 fathoms, but it then becomes shallower 

 I again to the north, and the depth lessens to 310 



N 





